The nineteenth century was a period of expansion and transformation of American agriculture. While much is known about the process, the exact pace and timing of agricultural productivity change is still unresolved. The traditional view is one of continued progress in which output and...

Based on data from several samples of probate inventories we construct and analyze a time series of slave prices for South Carolina from 1722 to 1809. These estimates reveal that prices fluctuated without trend prior to the 1760s and then began to rise rapidly, more than doubling by the early...

1. An overview of the history of economic ideas -- 2. The ethical foundations of economics -- 3. Property rights from Plato to the 21st century -- 4. The emergence of modern price theory -- 5. Money, lending and interest -- 6. Public finance in historical perspective -- 7. Depressing thoughts -...